Rumor: Google to fire 30% of Motorola Mobility employees once the deal closes

Google’s $12.5 billion acquisition of Motorla Mobility is expected to close by the end of this week. What Google plans to do after they swallow the company is a question that many journalists, analysts, and mobile enthusiasts have been wanting to know the answer to ever since the deal was announced way back in August 2011. According to TechCrunch, there’s a rumor floating around that Google will let go of 30% of the 19,000 people who presently work for Motorola Mobility. That’s about 5,700 employees. We have to stress, this is just a rumor, but it makes a lot of sense when you think about it. How many people does Motorola Mobility pay to handle their IT support? How many folks work on skinning Android? How many sales people are there? The list of people no longer needed goes on and on.

Assuming the layoffs do occur, and they will, we just don’t know how many, what happens after that? Will Google try to make Motorola Mobility healthy enough to compete with the companies that today depend on Android to make money? Will Google sell Motorola Mobility to a Chinese handset vendor looking to latch onto a strong brand? Again, we have absolutely no idea as to what’s going to go down.

If Google is serious about beating Apple, then they should run Motorola Mobility at break even. In other words, Google should sell phones for such a low price that they don’t make any money off them, but at the same time they don’t lose any money either. Why? Because the ad business is healthy, because Apple depends on insane margins to stay alive, and because that’s how Google can get operators to stop bitching and moaning about subsidies. It’s a crazy idea, and it likely isn’t going to happen, but it would be fun if it did.

What do you want to see Google do with the company that brought us the RAZR?

motorola build quality and a stock android with no skins or anything like that would be awesome. i cant wait for there phones to start coming out. finally a phone worth buying thats for sure..

An Observer

They could manufacture android phones with no manufacturer skin. Phones that will get every update from el goog, el rapido.

Or sell phones with the option of removing the skin.

But i’m dreaming, surely. . .

Red777

ahem, motorola mobility already selling phones to make no money — actually it loses money, and only gets to breakeven from the set-top biz. So you got your wish already at 3.3% smartphone market share. what a stupid acquisition!